(1) we are an online-only school.

(2) we offer a flagship full-time or part-time enrollment.

(3) we are an experimental school— expect new ideas each term.

(4) our school operates on Pacific Time (PT) although students join us from all over the world.

(5) all courses are taught live in English— class sizes generally range from 6-16 students.

(6) we work with students ages 10-15, roughly 5th-9th grade. Our flagship program focuses on the later middle school years, ages 12-15.

(7) our admissions process is need blind, and we meet 100% of demonstrated financial need— all families of any means are invited to apply.

(8) courses change every term, but here is a glimpse of the part-time courses offered in a previous term 👉 [Course Options Spring 23/24]

(9) our academic calendar for the 2024/2025 school year can be found 👉 [Astra Nova Calendar]]

(10) our faculty teach algebra I, geometry, and algebra II to our flagship students— we work with Art of Problem Solving to support students who need a different math class.

(11) we provide guidance and support, including Astra Nova transcripts and letters of recommendation, for our flagship students when they apply to high school. Some Astra Nova graduates attend the most selective boarding and day schools in the country.

(12) we hold two multi-day in-person events each year in Southern California for our flagship students in the fall (mountains near Palm Springs) and spring (coast near Santa Barbara)— we also host end-of-year events in Los Angeles for all Astra Nova families at beginning of June.

(13) we focus our energy on what really matters to the development of our students: their disposition towards learning and complexity, their ability to work effectively in teams, and their capacity to make ethical decisions.

(14) we are a small community of kind, curious, and ambitious people working together on big ideas. Any insights we glean from our school, we humbly share with the world.

Thoughts on Tuition

Astra Nova is a nonprofit tuition-based school. Astra Nova is also, we acknowledge, expensive--we do not have an annual fund, we do not actively solicit donations from families, and we do not receive money from the state or federal governments. Astra Nova relies almost entirely on tuition to pay for teachers' salaries, student supplies, and other program expenses.

Nonetheless, it is critically important to us that family finances should not prevent a child from attending Astra Nova. From the earliest days of Ad Astra to today, we have met 100% of demonstrated financial need for all families. This year, 33% of our flagship and 6% of our part-time families received some form of tuition assistance.

In order to evaluate demonstrated financial need, we use our new financial aid system, Clarity. Clarity is used by some of the best private schools in the country, and it is designed to be streamlined, fair, and easy to use. You can complete the application on your mobile device, and for most families the process will take less than 20 minutes.

Once a family successfully completes the financial aid application, we are bound by our Board of Directors to honor the tuition amount that Clarity calculates. We share all financial aid offers at the time of acceptance. It is important to note that not every family agrees with the tuition number that Clarity determines. The Clarity process assumes that families who choose private education will make their child’s tuition one of their top financial priorities, and some families may decide against enrollment after receiving their Clarity tuition number because they would like to prioritize other things, a decision we completely understand.

Astra Nova is fortunate to have a financial aid policy that is on par with the most prestigious (and wealthy) schools in the world. To maintain and to one day exceed this standard, we are unapologetically judicious with the financial aid we give out. If we have evidence that a family is interfering with the financial aid process by not divulging assets, manipulating documents, or not being fully forthright, we have no reservations about rescinding an offer of acceptance. We expect everyone in the Astra Nova community to operate with the highest standard of integrity. If that trust is breached, we will not be able to move forward with your family.

If you would like to apply for financial aid at Astra Nova, here are the steps to follow:

>>> Please have your child apply to the school before the next deadline.

>>> In the weeks following the deadline, we will review the applications and invite certain students to the second round of admissions. If we invite your child to that next round of the admissions process, and you would like to be considered for financial aid, please complete the Clarity process here: [https://auth.clarityapp.com/en/signup/].

>>> Clarity charges a non-refundable application fee of $60. They  automatically waive the application fee for certain low-income families in the U.S., but Astra Nova purchases additional fee waivers for all applicants with total family incomes of $75,000 or less. If you fall into that category, and your child has been invited to the next round of the admissions process, please email tara@astranova.org to request a fee waiver.